Who's Your Spiritual Teacher?

"Choosing a spiritual teacher is a very serious problem, and one should devote the kind of time and effort to it that one would devote to any fundamental problem in life."

The above quote is from an interview with Philip Kapleau Roshi by Helen Tworkin, published in Tricycle Review.

Wow. When I think back to all the Christian churches I've attended, some resonated with me more than others. Sometimes it was an instant attraction, and I knew I was 'home'. I couldn't get enough of it. Those times turned out to be the most healing, and provided me with what I needed then.

Inevitably, and sometimes sadly, the leaders moved on, or there were theological differences within the church, and they splintered. Sometimes church leadership was not pro-active enough in policing key employee's behavior resulting in rifts between members.

Regardless, I like the phrase, "When the student is ready, the teacher appears". I have found that to be true, time and time again. Sometimes my spiritual teacher turned out to be the most unsuspecting person I could have imagined. But they had a lesson to teach me, and then they vanished into thin air.

When the lesson is learned, sometimes the teacher disappears.

Life goes on.

Who was your most memorable, if fleeting, spiritual teacher?